This section provides background information related to the present disclosure which is not necessarily prior art.
In the aerospace and other manufacturing industries, the prior art uses the same pre-mixed two component cartridges or one component cartridges and air actuated dispense guns manipulated by people to apply sealants in the assembly process. For example, single acting shot meters use a displacement rod to control the application of sealer being pumped from a supply pump to a dispense gun. Robots use vision to locate the car body or seams on the car body to precisely locate the seams for sealer application.
Shortcomings of this prior art are:
Meter mixing equipment cannot guarantee the proper mix ratio during application.
Requires operator handle cartridges and apply sealer on large parts that are hard to reach resulting in significant human labor to apply sealers.
Operator fatigue and ergonomic constraints increase the chance of misapplied sealer.
Pneumatic applicators use compressed air to dispense sealer relying on operator technique to provide an acceptable application.
Air driven applicators have variability due to variations in molded cartridges, application temperature and changing viscosity of the material due to work life, and open time.
Disposable nozzles are not very dimensionally repeatable for use in a robotic application.
Human inspection of sealer applications on larger parts can be tedious and can result in operators unintentionally overlooking small areas potentially missing misapplied sealer application.